


The Brightest Game

by SavageInkSpillage



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Brotherly Bonding, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mind Control, Mind Games, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-10
Updated: 2013-12-14
Packaged: 2018-01-04 06:29:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1077703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SavageInkSpillage/pseuds/SavageInkSpillage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After being imprisoned for several months, Loki comes under the effect of a strange sickness. When the newly coronated king, Thor, is informed, he initially takes the liesmith's ramblings to be a symptom. Then, the shocking truth is revealed; the invasion of earth was mere child's play in comparison to the evil that threatens all the realms now. The evil, for their part, well... they just want to play a little game.</p>
<p>Can Loki gain the upper hand before Thanos manages to extinguish all life? Can he guide his supposed brother and his comrades to the dark realm of Thanos, before his half-life gives out and all is doomed?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Mad Prisoner

Loki, traitor of Asgard, plague of Midgard and son of Laufey, the jotun-king, stood proudly overlooking a vast valley. His garments screaming scarlet, skin unrepentantly blue and blazing with cold, he stood. In the valley, the sun shone. He’d tracked it overhead, coat shifting the sand, every step true and forceful. He alone had broken through the desert walls and claimed the land. Not through force, never through force... he had simply spoken. And those fools... his valley filled with glorious fools, they took his words as truth and then made _law_ out of them. The Silvertongue’s victory. The conquest of _words_. 

A disgraceful one according to the whole of Asgard, as it had required sword nor axe nor bow and in that wretched realm, that which remained clean of blood could not have been truly conquered. 

Yes, he remembered it well, the fragment of times gone past; he, a mere babe still, had cut his finger whilst on an exploration of the gardens, and bled for the first time in his vast and undying memory.  

_Then_ , he had been conquered by Odin. _Then_ , the moment the lone drop hit the grass, before he could even conjure up tears, he had joined the long list of stolen relics. He became the second and oft overlooked son of Odin on the edge of a leaf, and no one told him.

Well... he knew now. _He knew._ Bitterness turned to blood, and suddenly his fingers were stained red, blood starkly contrasting against the silver-blue skin it sought to escape from. The flow could not be stemmed, and when the first drop fell, far down into the valley of Loki the just and righteous King, the landscape changed.

Barren, cold, of life and light utterly void; his kingdom laid to ruin. From the charred homes of his people, the  chitauri arose. They moved through the wreckages like the parasites they were, slithering through crevices and scaling the cliff walls. After him, _again_ , frothing at the mouth like the beasts they were. Nothing human resided on their faces, nor under their skin; they were mere machines, with no capacity to listen beyond the implanted command, and they knew very few... mainly _kill_ , perhaps torture and then kill, if their superior was in a more benevolent mood.  

Ever closer they advanced… closer and closer to the perch of the once-king where vicious winds swirled around his form, leaving him trapped and powerless. Magic failed him. The Chitauri had no ears through which a lie could penetrate. Loki was done. Loki would die here, a God stripped of his divine right by these misshapen creatures of shadow. _How pathetic._

_Thor, with his endless golden light, he would’ve blinded these eyeless wretches and walked away a free man, a God among Gods. Damn him, then._

Of course, death would be too great a mercy for the fallen son... death was not what the Chitauri soldiers wrought. Instead, where their touches landed, flesh began to rot Disintegrating down to tendon, muscle and bone until nothing was left and no senses remained... the Jotun turned æsir switched races once more. He became a soldier among soldiers, a creature of the periphery where nought could be remembered. He walked among thousands moving as a single organism, he and them, the same. All the same. None had names, none had faces... they were nothing. They were all _nothing._  

* * *

 

 

Loki awakened in his cell, bathing in sweat. He would have screamed, had his voice allowed it... this day marked a second week of sickness. Not that he knew, of course, he had not the light to confirm it... what he knew was fever, and ache and a boneless fatigue that wouldn’t leave him, nightmares that failed to cease and hallucinations that refused to melt back into brick and stone until he was certain of... of his return. He could feel him under his skin, where magic had once throbbed so pleasurably.

**_“You remember me, then.”_** Thanos spoke from the far periphery of the universe, voice clear as its everlasting night.

“Yes, I re-remember y-you. I could n-not forget.” Loki heaved a distorted sigh. He could not, indeed. His every fiber revolted, just at the sound of that voice.

**_“I shall come, liesmith, for you have failed me.”_** the threat loomed, and yet didn’t. It wasn’t a threat at all; At its heart it was a vow, a promise sure to be upheld. 

“I reg-regret to i-inform you that I c-can no longer be o-of use. _Kill me_ , sire, l-let me trouble you no more. I am w-worthless, am I n-not? I stand to d-die regardless of your in-intrusion.” yes, Loki was the most talented liar the nine realms had ever borne witness to... but not a fool. Not arrogant enough to part take in this final game. If he rigged the dice, if he marked the proper cards, he may have been capable of cheating death in any other circumstance. But _this_ , this was of another order entirely. Death would be the _prize_! And behind the other curtain, the one woven from the hopeless darkness Thanos ruled and embodied entirely, there would be damnation. Eternal humiliation. He would be thrown away and used as a plaything by the rejects and the outcasts of the universe, savages all, and the end would not claim him. It would not dare intervene with the plans of the mad-titan, nor would anyone else. 

So, there laid the silvertongue, proud enough to grovel, with just enough arrogance to beg, to cry, to plead... and he did. The guards took note of his insanity, but were too intimidated to question him outright. A small number went to fetch the newly crowned king, leaving the majority behind to stand awkwardly at the sidelines of a spectacle none wanted to see.

**_“Perhaps I will not bother myself with your wretched hull... I might just destroy you from here. From my throne. And I shall watch as you spasm like a rabid dog, revel in the pain. I would not allow you death, I would keep you as a toy.”_ **

With that, the Sire of the unknowable took his leave of the prisoner’s mind, leaving him mad with fear. Mad with the anticipation of that which his mind could not contain, mad with... with _madness itself._  

* * *

 

 

When Thor, the golden god forever shrouded in light, slit through the darkness of the dungeon some time later, he saw a captive driven sick with sin. Perhaps an untamable, _infuriating_ portion of his mind saw a brother, suffering. Whatever the case, King Thor prided himself always on his keen sense of justice, if not on his wits. And to see a once proud man beg stone walls for death was not justice. Not at all.

Still, he remained weary of the liesmith and his fabled skill. For close to an hour, he stood on the threshold of the cell. The prisoner, a brother once, never acknowledged him once in all that time. Sunken eyes, greying lips, traces of vomit around the corners of his never-stilling mouth; he didn’t care for Thor’s attention, not for that of the guard… merely that of the shadows. The shadows that could apparently grant him his demise. He tracked their motions across the walls, eyes sliding over Thor as if he wasn’t even there. _Please,_ he said; _please kill me,_ he begged. _Please._

Loki had never been one to say it, not even as a child. Too prideful, too stubborn. And before Thor’s coronation, at his sentencing, the word hadn’t passed his lips either. Loki was a man of grace. A man of strength. An evil man, maybe, but also every inch a God. Gods did not beg for death. They _didn’t._ They simply bore their separate eternities until time ran out. They _didn’t beg!_ Why did he have to keep saying it? _Why_?

“ _Please_ ,” said Loki. Febrile, tired, _mad man_ Loki. He tried to lift an arm to grasp a handful of air, but it refused to rise. He was weak.

“ _Please,”_ sounded a fractured voice. Thor nearly yelled at him to keep quiet. He couldn’t stand to hear it anymore. That word… that _hateful word!_   

“ _Loki._ ” he darkly intoned, finding himself ignored in favour of a discolouration on the far wall. As he advanced on the gaunt, mewling thing that at one time might have shown features of one he loved, he kept track of the... _the conversation_ Loki was attempting. Fear arose within his broad chest, prompting him to call the ailing man once more, with more force. It was true, Thor didn’t believe in the redemption of the liesmith any longer. He didn’t believe it could ever be. He didn’t believe it could ever be _deserved_. Not after Midgard... but did he actively hate him? It took quite a lot of effort to maintain, hatred, and when Thor tried especially hard he thought of how exhausted Loki must’ve been when he let go of the Bifrost. How he would have been crushed beneath all of its weight, had he not fallen instead. Hatred was not it, exactly. It wasn’t trust, certainly no favour, but when he heard his once-brother barter with the shadows for death, something welled up within  him, strong enough to lift the prisoner’s diminished physique.

“Still your tongue now... you plead with bricks, Loki, nothing will come of it.”

First, he merely took inventory of the captive’s ailments: Fever, nausea; nothing too exotic save for a small collection of blood drops staining the cot just around the outline of his ears that no guard could explain.

“Th-Thor... is that y-you?” Loki whispered as though addressing a single star, out of the millions; he spoke as though he expected to be ignored, so very soft it was nearly the case.

“Yes, ‘tis I. Why does blood stain your ears, Loki?” 

“It... I-It hurts. When he s-speaks to me, it _h-hurts_. Can y-you not d-deliver me? I bring n-nothing but chaos... be r-rid of me...” even in his wretched state, Loki knew the plea to be futile. But then, a man with nothing to lose was free to risk what he pleased to.

“No. I shan’t be your executioner, Loki. If I had wished for you to receive the death-penalty I would have made it so. Now, tell me who speaks to you.” Thor cast a suspicious glance at the line of guards that stood, poorly pretending not to be listening in. Had one of them decided to go forth and have a spot of fun, at Loki’s expense? Ill-will, he could forgive, but he as king had commanded them to treat him with dignity; that made it their absolute _duty_ to obey.  

“ _Thanos_...” Loki moaned, leaving his once-brother to sag in both relief and abject sadness. His brother’s sharp wits had dulled in all this time spent ill.

“Thanos is not here, Loki, he cannot issue any harm.” Thor signaled a look to the guards. He hoped it to be an apology.

“Y-You misunderst-stand... he i-isn’t a person, n-not just... Thanos is an entity of e-energy. He can... c-claim any vessel h-he wishes, from a-a-any dis-distance... he only n-need... he on-only needs to...” sensing Loki’s growing distress, Thor softly shushed him. He sat there, on the edge of the cot, until a gurney arrived. Told himself he did it because he thought himself a fair king, and that he surely was, but kings never felt so keenly for their subjects as to cradle their weary heads. The guards saw, and wisely failed to comment.

“The man is half dead! Why was I not informed sooner?” he demanded after his brother had fallen blessedly unconscious.

“It was never as bad as this, sir. Not to my memory, at least. Not until just now. He’d been ill, certainly, but these dungeons see a lot of ailments, sire... if you would forgive my saying so, they seem to be detrimental to one’s health...” a meagre smile found its way onto his face.

“Listen well, if you ever dare mock my brother’s ailment again, I should see your loathsome tongue parted from your foul mouth before its final word could be completed.” Thor failed to notice his slip, familiar as it felt, and simply turned to sit beside his... yes, his brother, despite everything. Despite _Loki,_ really. 

Forgiveness should be earned, but bonds like the one they’d once shared, they just stayed. They existed throughout everything: even in the far distance of such utter hatred and chaos, the imprint was felt.

The guards, for their part, merely stood solemn and mute on the fringe of the tableau of the King and the mad prisoner. _His brother_. Thor tried to consider his earlier words... tried to conceive of a world in which he could believe his brother without hesitation, and wondered where that left them. If Thanos had claimed Loki’s body, had he been as much of a pawn as his supposed soldiers? Yes, it could also be a lie, a singular lie in an ocean of falsehoods, and thus easily disregarded... but he’d begged for _death._ Why weave the untruth which would exonerate him, if his goal was to die regardless?

Finally Thor decided he was to visit Odin - after he’d seen to his brother’s welfare, of course.

“I won’t have you killed, brother mine... I never would.”

“I am n-not your brother, you fool...” Loki returned to wakefulness with as hateful a hiss as he could manage on a quarter intake of breath.

“You would have your final moments filled with hatred, then?” somehow, the thought saddened Thor, even if he had no intention of ever allowing his brother’s demise.

“There w-would b-be no difference... you are a-as much a fool as you were before I l-left, I as much o-of a m-madman.” Loki stammered hatefully, eyes flickering briefly with the depth of his illness, his madness, and his _fear._   

“Could you withhold from such vitriol for just a moment, Loki? Allow this hapless fool to care for you now, before you berate me once more.” a healer came to stand stiffly beside the cot, handing his king potions to administer without so much as a glance at his former prince.

“I requested transport, healer… I should like the prisoner brought closer to my quarters.” Thor sought the eyes of the aged æsir and held them hostage with his own electrifying gaze, willing him to speak, to _act,_ beyond the passive passing of a few vials. “Your father said it would be unwise to allow the prisoner out of these confines.”

Thor let a sigh escape to signal his frustration. “Aye? Well, know then, healer, that though the Allfather may have deemed it so, it is _I_ you serve, and I would see this prisoner taken upstairs and his ills _tended to._ What I ask of my subjects is not kindness, it is not forgiveness, but if it is compassion and compassion alone that serves to separate the noble races of men from _beasts,_ then for the sake of the Norns, summon some up before the man dies! Shackled in the darkness, begging for aid from the bricks of his cell whilst those who dare call themselves _fair_ linger by and do nothing… you would expect me to sink so low? Out of sheer _spite_? Odin perhaps, perhaps the lot of you, but _not I,_ do you understand!?”

Thor turned on the onlooking guards with such force, half a dozen turned tail in search of a stretcher before he had completed the motion entirely.


	2. Chapter Two

 

“Thor…” as he heard his name, his demeanor gentled once more. 

“Th-thank you.” a tear slid down the ivory plane of Loki’s left cheek, red like the King’s cape, red like his rages, red like his desires, red like every death he’d ever borne witness to, and… red like blood. In the end, traitors bled no differently from heroes; the victors not more nobly than the defeated. Perhaps in their own minds. Yes, in the collective mind of Asgard, the blood of an æsir shone differently from the blood of perhaps a lowly Jotun, but as their sire could plainly see, it was not so. 

Perhaps it was then he vowed to see his brother well again, see him as a brother once more, perhaps this had occurred much sooner, but the vow was made regardless.

“You bleed, brother mine. Why do you bleed?” 

“I know n-not why. P-Please, I know I am a l-liar. I am. tr-truly… but I d-don’t know. I only know the pain. N-Nothing else. Y-You must believe me! Y-You must! I can f-feel it consuming m-me. _I don’t know why!”_ these four words, he repeated. He laid coiled up like a chilled child, rocking side to side with fear blazing from his emerald eyes.

“I believe you. Set aside your fears for this moment, Loki… we shall see you right soon eh, brother?”

The thunderer spilled his comforts freely, watching in despair as his once- and now again-brother seemed to lose himself in his chants. “Oh, Loki… you fool… I believe you. I truly do. Look at me, please.”

A liesmith with the gift of truth within his grasp would hold it close. Yes; he would not divulge it, choosing instead to weave his own twisted narrative. But for every second the scheme ran, he would never allow his chin to dip. Not even slightly. Even at his maddest moments, Loki had been a proud man. A true God, to all who beheld him, if not the kindest one available. He would not grovel like this, wouldn’t allow his prized mind to be poisoned such as this, nor his stature to be reduced to such a pitiable thing. 

This time Thor trusted him. This time Loki held the truth behind his eyes when their gazes met. 

Where sapphire had met emerald one brother had seen the other and the blatant truth emerged that both had cause to be fearful. 

“ _Look at me_ , Loki. Stop this… I shall do whatever is in my power to see you well once more, but you have to stay with me. Are we in agreement?” Thor had grasped his brother’s chin gently at the start of his plea and held it slightly firmer when he came to its end. “Are we in agreement, brother?” 

“ _Yes._ ” Loki said no more than this, but seeing how much effort it cost him to speak, the noble king of Asgard merely held both his prisoners gaze and hand and left him to his silence.

“Good. At my side then, Loki.”

And so it was, even when the guards came to carry the ailing captive to the healing quarters. 

“Has the pain lessened at all, brother?” Thor asked, stooping slightly to catch the answer as it drifted past on an exhale; “No.” the tormented man looked _guilty,_ saying so… _actually guilty._ “Loki? For Valhalla’s sake, brother, it is not your fault. Do not fret so, will you?” the king’s leathered palm came to rest on rough cloth, feeling bone and tendon slide and grind beneath it where it grasped Loki’s shoulder.

“I shall see to it you’re fed well, Loki. I’ll have the kitchens prepare something immediately.”

The liesmith snorted, incredulous; “They w-would never oblige y-you for one so lowly as I… and I c-cannot e-eat, regardless…” 

“You cannot…? Well, I shall see to the rectification of that issue… and no cook will deny an other from their king, lest they are a fool. But… mayhap mother would be so kind as to prepare a broth for you. She misses you, you know.” Thor’s smile widened when he saw the expression of peace that washed over his tormented sibling’s face at the mention of that blessed woman. It was the most sincere calm they’d shared since the start of this whole debacle.

“I m-miss her too… does she h-hate me? Like your father does?” and the fear Thor saw here trumped even Loki’s fear of the mad titan. He thought himself hated by perhaps the only person in the universe he still thoroughly loved. Thor wanted to disagree with the notion that Odin hated him but he was aware that it was by Frigga’s graces he still lived.

“She doesn’t. She could never. Come to think of it, neither could I. You will always have a place in our family, Loki. I know you doubt this, but it is true.” 

Loki choked on his answer and chose to keep it caged behind his lips. Thor theorized that it must have been something spiteful, but he was less certain of this now than he would have been before he had been summoned to the cell.

“I can’t… _breathe_ …” Thor immediately halted, bidding the guards at either end of the gurney to do the same. He knelt beside his ailing brother as he began to buck on the narrow stroke of fabric, tried to still the frantic motions as gently as he could. “Stop it! Loki, stop this; you’ll only harm yourself further!”

Sensing the growing desperation that radiated from Loki’s quivering form, he laid his hand softly over stricken green eyes and touched his lips to the liesmith’s ear. “Breathe now,” he softly bade. “Breathe, in and out. You can breathe, brother.” the hand came up to caress sweat-slicked hair. “All pain can be mastered, Loki. This I know you can do… in and out, that’s how it goes, just breathe…” his other hand, the king used to hold his brother’s fast-chilling counterpart. He could feel its nails leaving bloody crescents in his skin for all the force Loki’s fear had leant him. 

“Hush, brother, hush… breathe now, or you may yet turn _blue_!”

At long last, Loki succeeded in drawing a breath full enough to sustain him.

“I’m _supposed_ … to be blue… you dullard!” he panted, a smile at the edge of his greying lips.

And yes, the thought should have horrified the king, at the very least alienated him somehow, but with such a clear glimpse of the brother of old before him… well, what could he do but laugh?

“I _have_ missed you, brother…” he scooped the diminished form off the gurney and took off running before the guards could mount a protest. Loki was caught between laughter and pain as they speedily neared the gates of the wretched prison that had kept him for so long, and Thor would later _swear_ to have felt the relief flood his body as he charged outside like a freshly unleashed youth.

Then, sunlight hit his brother’s face, and all halted. Loki stiffened, breathing once again stilled, and cried his crimson tears… oh, sunlight, such blessed _light!_ He had no memory of it, it seemed. He remembered only the damp and stifling dark with its hands that clawed and eyes that glared and its many changing faces, its inhabitants; so infused by it they allowed it to turn them into savage beasts with no regard for anyone or anything… it was so _dark,_ dark enough to extinguish a life, as slowly as it dared… dark enough to ward off hope. Too dark to see, too dark to even draw breath… _too dark…_

 _“Loki!”_ said man came to with a jolt, staring blearily into the concerned face of a thunderer. “Be at peace, Loki. It is no longer dark! _Please,_ brother, I know not of this darkness… we are _outside,_ can you not see the sunlight?”

“S-Sunlight…” Loki thought of more than sunlight, letting the light stab him so savagely and so deliciously in the eyes… what it meant, this light, was freedom. Perhaps not from the heavy chains he still wore or the threat of the mad-titan nestled away inside his skull, but this light… it opened up the vast expanse of the universe, so that if even just in that moment, he could be _truly free_. He felt like he imagined Heimdal did; saw everything, heard everything, reveled in the tumult and the peace of the universe as it clashed with itself and sought to tore itself apart and yet held like the most tenuous and most glorious construction creation could ever have devised… oh, _sunlight!_  

“You laugh, brother…” any concern had been eradicated by the sound, and Thor decided he could leave his brother in the sacred open for a moment longer, before he had to charge on toward the healing room. The guards Thor had managed to escape from caught up with them during this brief respite, but they had not the heart to voice anger or tamper with the moment they had intruded on. They simply stood, as the captive prince basked in the light and the king held him firm, smiling in a way that seemed to eradicate all the shadows from all of Asgard… and when their king said it was time to go, they went.

Thor eyed the gurney they still dangled between them, held his brother slightly firmer to his chest and charged on. He felt the tremulous beat of Loki’s heart against his armor, saw his eyelids flutter… but every inch of his being shone with happiness, and somehow, that made him both less and more afraid. What if this feeling of euphoria was simply the last avenue his brain took before it reached a dead end?

Six-hundred-eighty-one steps it took to reach the healer’s quarters, and for every one Thor strained to ensure his brother’s heart still beat and his lungs still drew breath… sometimes he paused, fearful and unsure, but he always found reassurance. Again, and again, until at long last the broad doors loomed before him.

 

* * *

 

 

Some unfortunate subjects lay moaning nearest to the door, but… well, sod them and their bloody hunting accidents. Odin had once said that a true king would never yield to favouritism, but then; if there ever existed a more talented liar than the liesmith himself, it would have been the allfather. 

“I request aide on the prince’s behalf!”

At this request, healers speedily stole Loki from Thor’s arms and placed him on a bed. Together, they called forth magic that seemed to dance like sand in the wind, showing information Thor didn’t doubt was somehow vital, even if he had no idea how to read it.

He could see his brother’s eyes sweep over the orange coloured magic that incased him, reading it with such profound comprehension Thor felt like the thickest person in his own realm, and the proudest brother you could ever hope to find.

“Are you doing well, then?” the king inquired after spending too many moments left out of vital knowledge.

“No.” the word spewed forth between choppy intakes of breath that should have answered the question before it was ever asked, and although a certain exasperation shone through at having to answer it, the true venom which had marked Loki’s every word of late remained missing. For that, at least, Thor could be glad.

Slowly, perhaps deliberately or perhaps guided by sheer panic, the liesmith’s hand broke through the enchantments to seek another to hold. His brother could do nought but oblige, running calloused fingers over the dried blood that caked Loki’s palm, as it did seemingly every other inch of him.

He spotted a bowl of warm water and a cloth near a bed to his left, it’s inhabitant smiling at him as he went to take it. “Thank you, kind sir.” there weren’t many Asgardians left whom could look upon Loki so kindly, after all. Thor vaguely knew the man as one of seven brothers… so mayhap he knew the feeling. Between brothers there was a covenant, a promise, to look after one another even in the midst of a feud, even in the absence of a proper blood relation, even when all others would leave the stricken sibling to their fate, between sworn brothers there would always be care.

Thor gently took his brother’s hand and washed it with the cloth, spinning meandering tales of days long gone in which they had been no more than a pair of princes seeking entertainment in peacetime. The air around them swelled with the scent of herbs and the warmth of comfort. 

“Thank you…” mumbled Loki, his eyes shining brightly with pain regardless of how calm he willed himself to be.

“Do not thank me yet, Loki. Not yet. Tell me what I can do to help, thank me after I’ve done it, but not yet. And… brother? I’ll do whatever you require of me, but… not that. I will _never_ do that.”

“ _Please…_ ” Loki begged. A smile formed on his lips at the futility of it.

“What is it you fear so much?” after many a minute wasted in deliberation, this was the sentence Thor chose to breach the unstable silence.

Odin took it as a queue to storm into the infirmary and tear his sons apart. Incidentally, it wouldn’t have made too bad an answer to the question…


End file.
